A autobiography in which the anonymous writer intersperses personal reflections, anecdotes and lyrical poems with accounts of her travels and descriptions of the Japanese countryside. She illuminates her pilgrimages to temples and mystical dreams in exquisite prose, describing a journey that can be read as a metaphor for life itself.

Born at the height of the Heian period, the pseudonymous Lady Sarashina reveals much about the Japanese literary tradition in this haunting self-portrait. Born in 1008, Lady Sarashina was a lady-in-waiting of Heian-period Japan. Her work stands out for its descriptions of her travels and pilgrimages and is unique in the literature of the period, as well as one of the first in the genre of travel writing.

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